Anti-Climax

I see that Osama bin Laden has had some things to say about our mortgage woes. I’m surprised he didn’t weigh in on the tennis. If he had, he might have noted that the women’s final last night wasn’t very exciting, in part because of the foregone-conclusion nature of it, and in part because, after all the pre-match pomp (Carole King, looking leonine), and the buildup over the two weeks of toil that preceded it, it was just another tennis match, two sets out of three. Henin was masterful, but, by now, we’ve seen that in abundance. Come the final weekend, sometimes viewer fatigue kicks in. (I’ve realized that I’m more of a first-week guy.) The women’s tournament this year was one of the weakest in a while. But I felt the same way, a little, about the men’s semifinals; my burnout makes me appreciate how gruelling a tournament it is for those who actually have to play in it. As for today’s final, if Djokovic makes a match of it—and he’s certainly capable of that—then good theatre will stave off anti-climax. As the Federer-Nadal Wimbledon showdown demonstrated, a cracking final can make a tournament. Anyway, Sunday at four is a better time for a final than Saturday at eight. As soon as the U.S.T.A. (or CBS) moved the women’s final to Saturday prime time, a few years ago, the match took on more than it could bear. Of course, if it rains later, we may see the men’s final delayed, and moved to a prime-time slot.

Anyway, here’s an uncourageous prediction: Federer in four. Here’s another: in the second set, Dick Enberg will make a creepy comment about Federer’s musculature, which will be greeted in the broadcast booth by a silence that feels a little too long.

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